


The pain of free will

by FoggedReality



Category: The Outer Worlds (Video Game)
Genre: Alcohol, Anger, Angst, Bad Decisions, Based on the "good" ending, Burying emotions, Changed the rating back to M because cursing, Coping/not coping, Denial, Doubt, Drinking to Cope, Drowning Sorrows, Emotional Hurt, Excessive Drinking, Gen, Hangover, Hope, Hurt/Comfort, Introverts, Redemption, Self-Doubt, Survival, The Captain Despises Halcyon's Beverage Choices, if there is such a thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-02-19 13:21:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22745161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FoggedReality/pseuds/FoggedReality
Summary: Some spoilers for end discussion of The City and the Stars, Long Distance/Kept Secret but Not Forgotten, and ending.The Captain finds that all of her actions could have been for nothing.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 22





	1. Beginning of the End

**Author's Note:**

> My first fanfic, so I recognize that this attempt will be a bit disjointed. This is more to organize my thoughts, and hopefully will be the start of something bigger. Comments encouraged and welcomed. 
> 
> Reeling a bit from the discussion with Sophia in my peacekeeper playthrough, and needed to get this out of my head.
> 
> And I know I'm not quoting Akande's ultimatum exactly, and I don't care, because it's the intent that matters more.

The Captain had gone on this part of the journey alone, just in case it was a trap. It was, but not in the way she'd thought, and all-in-all probably for the best that the rest of the crew didn't hear what was said. Right now, there was no way she could take any questions or doubt or snarky comments from her crew. She was steaming, furious, her mind feeling like it was short-circuiting and burning itself from the inside out.

When she came storming back on board the Unreliable, Felix was standing in the foyer, organizing one of the storage lockers. He glanced up when the gangway slid closed with a quiet hiss, the start of a welcoming smile and his usual, "Hey, boss!" dying on his lips as he took in the expression on his captain's face.

He'd never seen that look, not once in their entire journey, and it was terrifying. Their captain was the very definition of quiet, kind, and easy-going, but _that_ look said she was going to murder everyone in her path and not think twice about it. Felix had a momentary and horrifying flash of the Captain standing over her crew's mangled bodies, blood splashed on the walls, covered in viscera, and howling like a raving marauder. He shrank back against the locker, wincing when it made a soft 'clang' as he bumped against it. His eyes widened for a moment, fear catching his breath in his throat when the Captain heard the noise and swiveled that murderous look in his direction. If looks were fatal, he would have melted like he'd been shot with a plasma round.

'I'm going to die now,' he thought, heart thundering in his chest and unable to move from the muscle-freezing, sprat-in-headlights fear, caught in that blistering stare. But instead of rushing forward with that unnatural blinding speed to thrust a sabre into his sternum, she blinked once as if he wasn't there and continued her momentum towards the stairs.

He managed to swallow somehow. 'Oh... shit...' was the next thought, as he finally managed to make his body obey his brain, running toward the opposite end of the ship, up the ladder in search of the rest of the crew. 'This is bad, this is bad, this is bad...'

The Captain barely registered his presence, mind still reeling from the meeting she'd just had with Adjutant Akande. How had she ever believed she could control the situation. A freshly awakened noob, out of time, and apparently way out of her depth. Overconfident from successfully negotiating peace time after time when everyone else seemed out for the other side's blood. How arrogant. How... stupid.

She took the steps to her cabin two at a time, slapping her hand on the door control as she passed through. The quiet, grating hiss of the hydraulics closing the door just made her angrier. She wanted it to slam, to rattle the walls, to echo through the steel of the ship, to skew all of the wall hangings with the force of it. She wanted everything around her to reflect the chaos of her emotions and the frustration of being played by someone who actually understood the game.

She thought she and Phineas were being clever, sending the Adjutant a corrupted signal, trying to play both sides until a nice, neutral, peaceful resolution could be accomplished. The Captain leaned both her hands on the desk in her quarters, shoulders slumped as she raged internally.

_"I need you to wipe out Edgewater," Akande had told her. "You put dissidents in power, now it needs to be destroyed to restore balance and save the colony." Akande had laid out the plan in detail, and when the Captain had told Akande exactly where she could shove that plan, the Adjutant had just smirked. "You don't really have a choice. You can say, 'Yes, madam Adjutant. I can do that for you. I'm on it.'" And that was the end of the conversation._

The Captain let out a pained howl, and swept everything from her desk onto the floor. The communications terminal slide off with a crash, monitor cracking and sparks flying out of its smoking interior. Papers and folders flew into the air and fluttered back down to the floor as the Captain screamed, flinging a warm, half-empty bottle of Zero Gee against the wall to punctuate her fury. She followed up by kicking over the pile of dirty clothes in the corner, multicolored cloth flying haphazardly over the rest of the mess on the floor.

There was no option, no other real choice. Telling Akande to fuck off again would have ended in bloodshed. She might have gotten off one stray half-aimed shot, maybe. But rationale prevailed, at least temporarily. What was it that someone had said once about shooting the devil? _"What happens if you miss?"_

She howled again, every ounce of rage given voice in the ragged scream, picking up the Officer's Spine from beside her bed and flinging it across the room. The door to her quarters slide open just as it thunked into the wall and hung there. The Vicar drew up short, eyeing the quivering blade just inches from his face, then slowly turning his gaze to his Captain. Worry replaced his usual stoic demeanor, real concern for what had happened to cause such an outburst from the woman who was normally their emotional compass.

Breathing heavily, realization that she'd come all too close to accidentally killing one of her crew members in her rage...one of her _friends_... finally broke the anger. She glanced down at her hands as the bubbling rage melted into simple agony. She'd gone too far, thinking she could actually make a difference here, thinking she was capable. She was a Law-be-damned safety inspector. That's all she was and that was all she would ever be. Not a voice for change. Not an envoy of peace. Not a savior. Not a hero.

She choked out a ragged cry and fell to her knees. Now that the rage was filtering away, the tears fell, and she buried her face in her hands, sobbing until she couldn't breathe. Max rushed toward her, kneeling beside her and after one moment of hesitation, unsure how she would take the sudden familiar touch, he wrapped his arms around her, gathering her in to him.

"Shh... Captain. It's okay. It's alright." He rocked her gently, glancing up as Parvati and Felix timidly glanced into the room. He shook his head at them, not wanting to overwhelm their Captain more. Watching till they reluctantly left and the door slid closed behind them, he turning his ministrations back to his Captain. Her sobs had slowed and she leaned into his comforting embrace, a spreading wetness on the arm of his sleeve from her tears.

"I can't..." she hiccuped, still regaining her breath, "I can't do this... I've failed." Max's expression tensed, a frown creasing his brow and drawing down his mouth in a hard line. He wondered what on Terra could have happened to cause this, and swore to himself he'd wrap his hands around the throat of whoever hurt her and slowly throttle the life from their body.

"No, Captain," he whispered against the soft silk of her hair. "You're alive, and we're with you. Whatever happened... as long as those two things are true, you'll never fail."

She wanted to believe, she really did. But right now, doubt had taken over. There was no way out of this situation without giving up, giving in, and destroying innocent lives in the process. The Adjutant had won.

The Board had won.

Law save them all.


	2. Drowning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The captain wallows in self-pity and the nagging little voices that speak ugly lies in her head.

The captain hadn’t emerged from her room in two days.

Okay, maybe that wasn’t entirely true. She did have to occasionally unsteadily weave her way down the hall to the one and _only_ bathroom on the entire frigging ship. _Who the hell designed this thing, anyway?_ But otherwise… why bother? She’d let them all down, and so she wallowed in despair, taking a page from Nyoka’s playbook and managing to stay at some level of sloshed. There were empty bottles littering her floor and desk, and she hadn’t bothered to pick up anything she’d knocked off in her previous rage. _Why bother._

“Why bother” was starting to feel like a pretty good personal motto.

She might as well give up. Even though they were in orbit over Edgewater, she couldn’t bring herself to give the order to land. Landing meant she’d actually have to do something, and that something was terrible. It was one thing to kill marauders or creatures that were trying their level best to kill her or the crew, but to murder innocents? It made her sick to even think about it, so she tried her best not to think at all.

Reaching for another bottle, she was sorely disappointed when only a single drop of backwashed liquor fell onto her waiting tongue. _Bah!_ Briefly, she had the urge to fling it across the room like a few other previously broken bottles, but in the end, she decided she just didn’t have the energy or the fury for it, letting it simply drop from her fingers and roll languidly across the floor.

That righteous rage was simply unsustainable. Max’s kind words and encouragement as he’d held her close just didn’t stick. A few days ago, she might have taken his words with a nod and a slightly embarrassed smile, but after her meeting with the Adjutant, it was meaningless. Just words and semi-pitying sounds _. Ugh… pity._ It left a bad taste in her mouth, and she’d let it drag her into a bottle to try to wash it all away.

It wasn’t a habit, was it? Definitely not like Nyoka. _That_ girl had a problem. The captain could count on one hand… okay, _both_ hands… the number of times she herself ever been seriously drunk. Most of the time, it was social; a long night out on the weekend with friends where a couple of beers had turned into a half dozen beers and a few shots. She’d only ever been blind drunk twice in her life: once when she broke up with her boyfriend of five years, and once when she’d lost her dream job during a corporate merger.

Except now it was three times. _Did three times make it habitual?_

The captain flung her arm over her eyes and groaned.

Waiting… that’s what she was really doing, if she would only admit it. Waiting for the crew to be fed up with her shit and just go back to their old lives in disgust. Waiting for the Board to send ships to blast them out of the sky once they realized she was not planning on helping them. Waiting for Akande to send soldiers to arrest her or put a bounty on her for treason and whatever other half-baked charges they could come up with. Waiting for them to throw her in a max security asteroid hellhole and throw away the key. Waiting for Phineus to call and tell her how disappointed he was and why on Law’s green earth he picked _her_ to revive, he’d never be able to fathom. Waiting for her friends to tell her they were just _done_.

With these thoughts rolling through her head, she was definitely sobering up…some. _Well,_ _we just can’t have that yet, can we?_

She rolled out of her bunk, landing rather neatly on her hands and knees, but had to grasp the light bar and a cabinet handle to help haul herself to her feet. _Nope… not steady. Yep…still drunk._ The room spun for a moment before she got her bearings again, then lurched toward her door, unsteadily grasping the railing as she tried to march out with her head high but stumbled on the very first step instead. _Graceful…_

She actually managed to make it up the stairs without falling backwards and cracking her stupid skull open on the sharp metal edge, but it was a bit of a close thing a couple of times. Briefly, she wondered if it would be wise to actually try to make it back down the stairs after this little journey for liquid memory loss. Maybe she could just hide under that big table and sneak out occasionally like a sprat, hording a few bites of food and a couple of bottles of some of that terrible, terrible stuff they somehow legally called “vodka” in this colony. There was nothing even slightly potato-y…or even tasteless…about it. Good vodka was smooth and unscented and had a gloriously delicious burn when it went down. This stuff smelled like burned engine oil and tasted like the mutant offspring of rubbing alcohol and spoiled milk.

And there was an unopened bottle on the counter _right there._

But there was also suddenly a Felix-shaped object directly in her way.

_Wait… what?_

The captain shook herself to try to clear her head, which was completely useless and just made the room spin again. It didn’t make the Felix-thing move or shift or be anywhere but standing _right_ _there_ , and it looked pissed, arms folded over its chest, scowling in only a way it seemed to be able to.

“Hey, boss.” It was its… _er_ … _his_ standard greeting, and it grounded her but only by a fraction.

“Felix! I thought you were a thing.”

His anger melted into an expression of pure confusion so quickly that the captain couldn’t hold back a snort of laughter at her own fugue.

“Okay, that’s it. We’re sobering you up.”

“What? No! I need to… to… to…”

“Uh huh.” Whatever fear Felix had of her a few days before seemed to have completely disappeared with the state she was in now. Uncrossing his arms, he took her by the arm and unceremoniously led her to the bathroom. “You’re done moping.”

“Yer one to talk, Fix… er…Flix… uh… Fee-licks.” _There! Third time’s the charm!_ “I’m fine!”

“You’re really not, boss.”

“Who ap.. appoint…en…ed _you_ as my conscience, anyway, huh?”

“Me.” Pulling her inside the small room behind him, he didn’t bother closing the door after. He was pretty sure half the crew was now peeking out of their quarters, watching this train wreck happen. That was perfectly fine by him. None of them were stopping him, and he was tired of waiting for one of them to actually _say_ something the few times they’d caught glimpses of their captain in the last couple of days.

“Fuck you, F’lix.”

He took a deep breath, pulling himself up to his full height… which wasn’t much more than hers, to be honest. But his expression was set, unhappy with her in so very many ways, and swearing at him was pretty much the last straw. He thrust her under the showerhead and slammed his hand against the switch, turning on a freezing blast of water directly over his still fully-clothed captain _. Oh, he was so going to find himself in the airlock for this one_ … but someone had to do _something_.

Felix took two involuntary steps backward when she shrieked in surprise at the sudden icy deluge. He half-expected Max or Ellie to come running, but then figured they were waiting to see if a sudden spray of arterial blood was going to explode from the doorway as their captain murdered him for daring such a thing.

She wouldn’t do such a thing, would she? She was so kind and calm and generous to a fault and believed in the good in people even at their worst. She believed in _them_ , her crew, even when they’d failed _her_. But he also remembered how completely terrifying she was when they were fighting for their lives... or when she’d turned those vacant, hate-filled eyes in his direction two days ago.

He swallowed hard and held his ground… or would have if the captain hadn’t suddenly just burst into tears, covering her face with her hands as she stood in the cold deluge, shivering and sobbing. His heart melted… just _melted_ in agony right there in his chest… and he found himself moving toward her again, one hand reaching to shut off the water as he swept her against him with the other. Arms wrapping protectively around her, he whispered to her, “I’m sorry, boss. I didn’t… I had to… I mean… I was worried. _We_ were worried. Please don’t kill me.”

It took a few moments for his last to sink in. “What?” She finally raised her head to look at him, her confusion matching what his had been earlier. “Why would I…?” But she frowned midway through her sentence. “I’ve been awful, haven't I _… I’m_ the one who’s sorry.”

Pulling carefully away from him, she dropped her gaze, embarrassed by her actions and that any of her crew had to resort to this to snap her out of a downward spiral. _They hate me now_ … “Can you… uh… find me some dry clothes? And a couple of those caffienoid things Nyoka swears by?”

“Sure, boss.”

“Lemme sober up, and I’ll…” _Whine. Grouse. Whimper. Grovel. Beg for forgiveness. Prove what a failure I am._ “…explain what I can. ‘Kay?”

“Gotcha, boss. Back in a jiffy."

Self-pity...no... _Self-loathing_ crept over her as she stood dripping and shivering, clutching her arms to her chest. She could already feel the edges of a blistering hangover creeping in, hoping she had the strength to tell her crew what they were about to face.


	3. Doomed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Super short chapter where the captain finds herself regretting many, many things.

“She wants you to WHAT?!?” Max’s palms slammed down on the table, rattling silverware and cups, and sloshing some of the captain’s purpleberry soda onto the table.

This stuff was just as disgusting as the vodka she’d imbibed previously, but with added sugar and some weird faux-fruit chemical aftertaste. Whatever purpleberries were supposed to taste like, she was pretty sure this was not it…and also why she would never, ever try that nanner nastiness. She seriously doubted that anyone had mastered banana flavoring in the last half-century, and it was disgusting enough before.

She realized they were all staring at her expectantly, and she blinked, slouching more in her chair. “Sorry… headache is catching up.” Which was technically true; her hangover was promising to be monumental, but it didn’t account for how distracted she was. She certainly wasn’t being very captainy, and her mood had bottomed out. She desperately wanted another drink, but the crew was withholding, damn them, so she took a sip from the purple liquid in front of her, unable to fend off a disgusted shiver before pushing it away and vowing to stick to water from now on.

“You’re not gonna do it, are you Captain?” Parvati spoke softly, looking just as sick as the captain felt, pale and worried and fidgeting in her chair. This _was_ her home they were talking about, after all.

“No…I can’t. I’d never.” She stretched her arm out on the table in front of her and rested her head in the crook. That was better… a bit. Except now her sleeve was resting in a puddle of purple liquid, soaking it up like the cloth of her shirt was the one with the dry, cottony mouth. … _shit_ …

“But I expect Akande” … _the_ _bitch_ … “will be putting out a bounty soon. This was a loyalty test, and we failed it without a doubt.”

Felix crossed his arms and leaned back on two legs of his chair. “Good!”

“Felix!” Max scowled at him like he wondered if he could get away with kicking the chair legs out and letting the kid crash to the floor. “This is serious.”

“I know it’s serious. They need to be shown _serious_. All they ever do is take from everyone. So, it’s about time someone stood up to them.” Punctuating his declaration, his chair thunked back down on all four legs with a loud metal clang. “So, good for you, boss. But if _this_ is what you were upset about…?”

“Um… yeah. Upset doesn’t begin to describe it. How about I don’t want to robo-murder anyone, and I don’t think Phin will appreciate thawing me out just so I can turn around and rot in prison.” _Among a zillion other things that the doc would be disappointed in._

“We won’t let that happen, Captain.” Good ol’ Max. He always sounded so sure of himself.

“It’s suicide, Vicar. You stand up to them, you get gunned down in a hail of bullets.” _Plasma rounds? Corrosive slugs? Zappy things? Ugh.._.the ache in her head was starting to crawl its way down her jaw and across the backs of her eyes, punching nerve endings all the way. This one was going to be a doozy.

“We’ve faced worse, boss.”

 _No we haven’t_ , is what she really wanted to say, but it was miserable and petty. So they’d faced down a few fire-spitting mantiqueens, rapts that could swallow them in one bite, and more than a few packs of psycho mauraders and malfunctioning bots. So what? But the Board… they had an actual army by way of UDL, a reputation for awfulness, a massive propaganda machine, and resources enough to throw everything in the colony at them, including the proverbial kitchen sink.

They were just one tiny unarmed ship, manned by Captain Popsicle, five misfits, and a cleaning bot.

They were doomed.


	4. Not All News is Bad News

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Captain reluctantly agrees to a call with Welles, and things might just turn around.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The author has taken some creative liberties with the timeline (when certain discussions take place, normally at the end of The City and the Stars), and with the actual conversation (rather than quoting the game verbatim).

“Captain!” ADA’s voice cut through her eardrums like a machete. Screw Nyoka and her stupid caffeine drugs that did absolutely nothing except make her nerves vibrate like live wires. Even her hands were shaking visibly, so sleep was definitely _not_ happening anytime soon. “Incoming transmission from Phineus Welles.”

Her heart sank. Her first inclination was to tell ADA to deny the transmission, because as soon as she heard his name, the little voices in her head started reminding her how awful she was at her job so far, and how badly they’d screwed up this time around too. He wouldn’t even have to say anything, just scowl at her from under those bushy brows and that would be enough to undo her facade of control. Sighing heavily, she pushed herself up from her desk chair with an effort.

“On my way.” _Eventually_. Taking the longest, most round-about way to the bridge, she trudged up the stairs and grabbed a bottle of whatever _wasn’t_ Rizzo’s from the fridge before sliding down two ladders and weaving her way through the supply boxes in the hold. Slumping into her command chair… _no, it was Alex Hawthorne’s chair. I don’t deserve this chair_ … she popped open the bottle of wooly milk and drained half before finally giving ADA permission to put Welles through.

“Captain, I have news! You need…” His initial excitement waned as he paused, squinting through the screen. “Captain…you look _terrible_.”

 _Speak for yourself, you frumpy old man._ She set the bottle on the console next to her, despite ADA’s immediate judgey, artificial, ‘I can’t believe you just sullied my equipment!’ glare, and ran both hands through her own wild hair. “I haven’t slept.” _And I’m coming down off a bender. So back off!_

“Ah. Yes. Well. Perhaps this will help you sleep more soundly. Or perhaps not.” Peering suspiciously at her for a moment longer, he took a quick step back from the screen, framing himself in a slightly less intimidating and intrusive way. “I’ve gone through the chemicals you so thoughtfully brought to me, and with dilutions and additives and the right combinations, we have enough to start reviving the Hope colonists.”

 _You mean the chemicals that you ordered us to go and fetch_. _Nevermind all the people we had to kill on the way._ “Okay…we… sort of knew that was possible from our meeting before _…” Before the disastrous visit with the Adjutant._

“Yes, yes. But I mean we _really_ can begin now. Something your slow male companion mentioned when you were visiting… that it was too bad my lab wasn’t next to the Hope.”

She nodded, but couldn’t really help but frown. Leave it to Felix…

“So, it gave me an idea. Why _couldn’t_ the lab be next to the Hope? Or rather… why couldn’t the Hope be directly outside my lab?”

He started typing frantically on a keypad offscreen. “I’m sending you the coordinates and docking codes now. I want you to connect your ship with the Hope and skip it here to my lab. We’ll be able to start reviving them immediately.”

“Wait… you want me to… why can’t we just fly it remotely?”

“Because it’s been offline for decades. And it’s an old AI, so it likely needs a manual reboot of some sort.”

“And did you say… _skip_ it? _Inside_ the system? Into Terra’s rings?“

“Yes, yes. We don’t have time to waste. If the Board catches wind of what we’re doing, they’ll try to stop us. This way, it will be right under their noses, and they’ll never be the wiser.”

The captain didn’t want to admit that this supremely insane, _suicidal_ plan actually sparked a light at the end of her long downward-spiraling tunnel. “ADA… is this even possible?”

“It’s quite dangerous, Captain. If calculations are even slightly off, we could fly into the planet… or the sun.”

 _Did… did ADA just smirk at her?_ The captain shook her head and turned back to the monitor. "Phineus Welles, if you were actually in the same room right now, I think I'd have to kiss you."

"Ah, well... uhm... yes. That would be... ah... awkward. And unprofessional." _And was he actually blushing?_

Suddenly giddy with relief and the possibility of not going down with the crew in a hail of gunfire like some futuristic Bonnie and Clyde, the captain stood up, took the edges of the monitor in both hands and planted a big, wet smooch right on the screen. _Yep, he was definitely blushing now._

“Okay, Phin, we’re on the way. ADA, set a course for the Hope!” _And call the crew together to give a collective middle finger to Madam Adjutant Sophia Fucking Akande and her awful demands, while you’re at it._ She turned her gaze out the view port to the surface of Terra 2, looking tranquil and oblivious to the drama that had been playing out miles above the surface.

Things were starting to look up.


	5. Crash and burn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How had she ever thought this was going to be easy?
> 
> Talking their way past the guards in the Hope's docking bay had been easy. This part was definitely not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another gaming gut-punch, this time on the Hope. Skip this section if you haven't played through, because... ugh... very spoilery and not in good ways.

How had she ever thought this was going to be easy?

Talking their way past the guards in the Hope's docking bay had been easy. _This_ was not.

Parvati had retreated to a far section of the hallway and had leaned her head against the wall, retching, until deciding she'd had enough, and crawled her way back to the Unreliable. It was a mistake to have brought her along, but the captain had been concerned about what repairs might need to be made to a ship that had been derelict for decades. 

Standing over one of the monitors, the captain was regretting ever looking through the crew logs, because of _this_. Malfunctions, starvation, mutiny. Eating… feasting… pulling sleeping colonists from their pods and…

“Bastards.” It was said so quietly that she barely recognized it was coming from her own lips. “Fucking… bastards.” Her voice rose with each word, along with the boiling fury that started to consume her again. Akande was nothing, _nothing_ to this. “God. Damn. Fucking. _Monsters_!” There were people she knew in those pods, and she punctuated each word with a fist against the computer screen, making it shudder in its housing. “Mother. F _uckers_!”

She was screaming now, curses disintegrating into a ceaseless, wordless howl. Gloved fist cracked the screen with the next blow, the text onscreen flickering on and off as circuits shook loose. Glass shattered with the next, sparks flying out from the creaking, complaining machine, but she didn’t stop…couldn’t stop… until she’d shoved her arm up to the elbow into the guts and grabbed, coming out with a handful of sparking, spitting wires.

She was trembling, panting, just staring at the smoldering, useless hardware when she heard the shuffle of hesitant footsteps behind her. Normally, she would have turned around to face whoever was approaching, but she just couldn’t bring herself to move to save herself. Flinging the handful of wires and cables away, her burning eyes fell toward the floor, shoulders sagging. _Let them come…_

Instead of hateful soldiers or unfeeling automatons with guns blazing, Max gently gripped her shoulder, but she still smothered the urge to flinch away from his comforting touch. This was the second time he’d seen the results of the temper she usually kept well in-check behind her façade of calmness.

Being an introvert was a curse, everything turned inward and hidden from the rest of the world. The smiles and friendliness and empathy were genuine. It made her easy to get along with, but hard to get to know. Sudden outbursts like this only came when she was burdened with one too many things and had no outlet for the bottled pain. Past rages had always been controlled… sobbing alone behind closed doors, screaming into a pillow, or throwing stuffed animals because damage and fallout would be confined to herself, not burdening anyone else in the process of release. Once it was out of her system, it had always been like flipping a switch, and the sweet, kindhearted persona easily took over again.

But not this time. Part of her was humiliated that anyone saw her fall apart at all… _twice_ … and part of her was embarrassed that she’d lost complete control again. The rest was still angry, furious at this world and all the completely fucked up things that these people were capable of. Worst of all, there was no escape from it. This was her life now, and she hated it.

“Captain?” Squeezing her shoulder gently to bring her back to the here and now, Max kept his voice low, a tone of concern tinting that one word with a dozen questions he wasn’t sure if he should give voice to. Saying anything out loud now would put a finality on it, making everything they’d seen on this ghost ship real and not some waking nightmare. He had no idea the depths of how this was affecting her, although he was beginning to suspect.

Drawing a long, deep breath, the captain almost said that she was okay, but she wasn’t. She _really_ wasn’t, and she couldn’t lie about it after that display. There was nothing that would make this okay, and her gaze drifted once more to the empty, discarded pods stacked haphazardly throughout the room. Trying very hard not to look too closely at the dried goop and darker stains on the floor and the sides of the pods, she straightened, brushing her hands down the front of her armor _(as if I could smooth out wrinkles in steel…what is wrong with you?),_ trying to regain some semblance of control over her raging emotions and roiling stomach. Now that she knew what that cloyingly sweet smell in the air was, the latter was much more difficult, bile burning an acid trail down the back of her throat.

Huffing out a frustrated breath, she let her head fall back against his shoulder, startling herself out of her internal war with the unyielding *clank* of skull connecting with the metal of his bulky armor. The stoic vicar surprised her even more with a quickly stifled snort of laughter.

“Ah… ahem… sorry, Captain.” He was struggling, she could tell from the breathy grumble as he cleared his throat. “That was… uncalled for and inappropriate.”

Pulling away, she rubbed the back of her head with her hand, turning a pained scowl toward the vicar. Unfortunately, he’d hit the end of his own frayed nerves, and he snorted another laugh at her expression, this time unable to stop himself. The sound of his verging-on-hysterical, open amusement…and that she rarely ever saw him crack a smile, much less getting this much enjoyment something so awkward and human… she couldn’t help but smile in return, the humor quickly infecting her until they were both leaning against each other, holding the other up, wracked with laughter.

It was ADA who sobered them enough to get back to the task at hand, breaking through their comms, with a concerned tone. _Could she really sound concerned? Note to self, have a long talk with ADA about this self-awareness thing she keeps denying._ “Captain? Is everything alright? Inappropriate laughter can be a sign of oxygen deprivation.”

“We’re fine, ADA… just….” Wiping her eyes as she glanced up at Max, she almost started snickering again, quickly looking away and once again pushing away from him to become The Captain again. “Nevermind. We’re fine. On the way to the bridge now. Stand by to initiate jump.”

“Are we still going to do this, Captain?”

“After all _this_?” Gesturing to the room and all the debris and death around them, she met Max’s eyes with a firm nod. “You damned well better believe we are.”

As she shouldered her rifle, striding out the door, Max could only shake his head at her rapidly swinging moods, concern once more darkening his features as he grabbed his shotgun and followed her to the bridge.


	6. Plans? What plans?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Post-Tartarus discussion with the team.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very short and sweet, because it needed to wrap up. Might lead to a new post-game story, but this one's been hanging over my head for a while, so wanted to finish this part up. Thank you for reading!

“Captain, you have to sit still.” Ellie sat back on her heels, glaring at the captain.

“It hurts!”

“Well, of course it hurts! She shot you! Now quitcher whining and let me take care of it.” She took hold of the captain’s arm again, wiping away the blood and examining the wound. “Went through. Just need to stitch you up and you’ll live. Have a nice scar to brag about and everything.”

The captain sighed, gritting her teeth against more pain, watching Phineus curiously as he paced back and forth. He was muttering to himself, rubbing his wrists where Ellie had already bandaged him up from the electric burns he’d suffered while Akande tortured him. He’d already explained how Earth had gone silent and what that meant for the colony’s survival, while Felix had told with great glee how the captain had shot the Chairman, “…right between the eyes… didn’t even let him say _anything_. It was the greatest single thing I’ve ever seen in my life!”

“We killed mantiqueens, Felix.” Nyoka interrupted.

“I stand by my statement.”

“What now, Doc?” Max broke his silence and Welles’ pacing, ready to keep moving forward, even after all the death and destruction. Others had started to drift into the conference room now that the prison levels had been cleared out or the last of the guards had surrendered. Sanjar and Zora both collapsed into chairs around the table, and Ellie moved to check them for serious injuries while the others worked out details.

“We have a lot of work to do. We must begin the revival process immediately…and then we’re going to fix this damn colony, one problem at a time… but…”

“There’s always a ‘but’…” Max groaned, slumping into a chair, glancing up as Malin sauntered in grinning and covered in blood, laying her shotgun on the table as she took up another seat.

Ellie snickered, and quietly murmured, “Butt.”

“Ellie! Seriously, I expect that from Felix, but not from you.” The captain rolled her eyes, and pushed back after the sawbones slapped a bandage over her stitches. “Phin… it can’t be much worse than what we’ve already seen. What else is there?”

“Well… we’re going to need a leader. And I can’t imagine a better person for the job than you. What do you say?” He gestured to the others around the table, including them in the voiced proposition, nodding to Commandant Sanita as she left her Mardets at the door and joined them.

“Are you insane?! I’ve had more meltdowns in the last few months than… well… ever!”

“But you did what none of us could.”

“Doc’s right, boss.” Felix came over and sat down next to her, and even Max nodded in agreement. “You shouldered a hell of a lot. Anyone else would have broken.”

“But…I _did_ break. I’m nobody. I can’t run a colony.”

“You’re not nobody! You’re our _Captain_ , Captain. You did fine helping Edgewater…and Stellar Bay…and the Groundbreaker…and…Doc Welles.” Parvati gestured to the gathered leaders around the table, who were all nodding. “They wouldn’t be here if you were ‘nobody.’”

Felix edged in closer, hands on the arms of her chair, meeting her eyes with a smile. “And you’ve had us here, boss. Every step of the way. That ain’t gonna change.”

She breathed deeply, eyes drifting between the expectant faces of her crew… and finally nodded. “IF the colony will have me. I’m not about to be just some self-appointed replacement for the Chairman.” She turned to the rest of the room. “If _you’ll_ have me. And if you’ll be my council. We’re not doing this the way it was, so we’re not gonna have all this stupid Board red tape I keep hearing about. If it needs fixing, we fix it. No sending stuff through every sub-committee in the galaxy. No year-long approvals or forms to fill out forms or bureaucratic nightmares. People are starving and we’re on our own, and all of that shit will only end up killing us all. Deal?”

She blushed crimson as the room burst into applause…and an even deeper shade at the look Max was giving her, pride and...something else.

This might just work out after all.


End file.
